My Bloody Valentine
My Bloody Ears! From the light, ethereal intro of "I Only Said" to "When You Sleep" all the way to the seizure-inducing, tympanic membrane-shattering 30 minute "You Made Me Realize" finale, My Bloody Valentine completely rocked the Aragon Ballroom and uptown Chicago, likely causing some sensorineural hearing loss among those in the mesmerized crowd who opted not to use earplugs. But hell, if you're going to lose your hearing, you might as well lose it to MBV, one of the few bands on my short list of "Bands You Must See Before You Die". They did nothing to shed their reputation of being shy and mysterious, not even greeting or acknowledging the audience until close to the end of the show. However, they let their music do the talking. Favorites from 'Loveless' included an uber-fuzzy "Come In Alone", personal fave "When You Sleep", and the jangly loudness of "Soon". It's too bad they didn't do the crowd favorite "Sometimes" or another fave of mine, the JAMC-esque "Drive It All Over Me". Nothing could prepare me for the earth-shattering finale though. It felt like someone stuck a lit M80 in each of my ears.
No videos up yet, but there were plenty of people taking them so check YouTube soon. Unfortunately, my camera conveniently ran out of batteries.